October 12, 2026 Quick space links

2:52 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

1 comment

The human colonization of the solar system is now unstoppable, except by force

12:27 pm

The new century will see a renaissance of space exploration as exciting and as challenging as the space race of the 1960’s. And this rebirth will happen under the banner of freedom and private property, the very principles for which the United States fought the Cold War. [predicted in 1998 in Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, p. 263].

Investment in space since 2023
Investment in space since 2023, from the
Space Capital report in July 2026.

More than any other moment since the launch of Sputnik in 1957, the future of the human race’s effort to explore and settle the solar system is right now shining bright and hopeful, with everything converging enthusiastically in a manner that — if nothing is done to forcibly stop it — will make that colonization inevitable.

To understand that convergence, it necessary to understand how radically different this situation is. Unlike every space effort since Sputnik, space exploration is no longer controlled by governments. No longer do innovators and space geeks need to go to lawmakers, their hands out begging for money. Space exploration is now in the hands of private capital, which is quite generously committing a lot of money to fund a lot of space projects — not because these investors want to explore the stars — but because they see a lot of profits to be made.

This fact — that governments no longer control the situation — is what is driving this renaissance. It is also the one fact that might kill it, but I am getting ahead of myself. I must first describe this renaissance, in all its glory.
» Read more

6 comments

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

Arizona joins the competition for NASA’s United States Space Academy

8:55 am

The Democratic governor of Arizona, Katie Hobbs, late last week announced a committee aimed at getting NASA to choose Arizona as the home of Trump’s proposed United States Space Academy.

“Arizona is bringing together the state’s pre-eminent leaders on space science and exploration, representing our world-class universities, industry partners, local communities and the Arizona Space Commission to build a strong proposal for NASA,” Hobbs said. “Together, we are going to secure the U.S. Space Academy for our state and continue Arizona’s dominance in cutting-edge advanced manufacturing, aerospace and defense, and science and engineering,” she added.

Seven states now have put together teams to lobby for the academy: Arizona, Florida, Louisiana, Ohio, Texas, Alabama, and a private operation in Nevada. All are logical candidates because each has substantial commercial and government industries. So have California, Maryland, Virginia, Colorado, and Washington, but these states are run entirely by Democrats, and thus their governments are likely to resist lobbying for this academy, simply because the standard policy of the Democrat Party since 2016 has been to oppose anything Donald Trump does, no matter how reasonable or successful.

In fact, it is somewhat surprising Hobbs has taken this action, as she is a Democrat. I suspect her action stems from the relatively weak domination of Democrats in Arizona. She might be governor, but the state legislature is controlled by Republicans, and no Democrat is ever assured of victory in any election in this state.

0 comments

Starship from 13th test flight returns to Texas; 15th flight now targeting November

10:29 am

Starship #20 returning to Texas
Starship #20 returning to Texas. Click for source.

The Starship prototype (#40) that flew on the 13th test flight of Starship/Superheavy in July 2026 and remained afloat after landing has now returned to Texas.

The ship arrived at the Port of Brownsville on the morning of Oct. 7 and is currently slated to be rolled back to the production site tonight, with a closure set from 10:55 pm to 5:00 am CDT.

The ship will be rolled horizontally on the cradle that was on Forte’s deck [The ship that transported Starship across the ocean]. SpaceX designed the cradle so that it could be picked up with the K25 self-propelled modular trailers and then rolled off the ship. This will give SpaceX some practice in transporting a ship horizontally.

Once at the production site, SpaceX will likely do extensive inspections of the inside of Ship 40, and possibly practice ship breakover operations. It will be interesting to watch what SpaceX does with Ship 40 over the coming weeks.

Even more important, according to the FAA the 15th test flight is now targeting a November 8, 2026 launch date, with the 16th test flight — the first from Florida — targeting a December 10, 2026 liftoff.

These dates, unconfirmed by SpaceX, remain very tentative. They are also a delay from an earlier FAA announcement last month, which then suggested SpaceX was aiming for an October launch for both.

7 comments

Conscious Choice cover

Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!

From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.

 
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.  
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.

 

“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society.

 

All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.

SpaceX launches 21 satellites for the War Department

9:34 am

SpaceX last night successfully launched 21 satellites for the War Department, its Falcon 9 lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base. This was the fourth of nine launches by SpaceX to launch the military’s Tranche constellation, which when completed will have more than 150 satellites. The constellations is “a mesh network of optically connected satellites in low-Earth orbit that enable global military tactical communications and missile warning, indication, and tracking capabilities.”

The first stage (B1103) completed its sixth flight (59 days after its previous mission), landing back at Vandenberg. The two fairings both completed their second flight respectively.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

115 SpaceX
61 China
16 Rocket Lab (plus two suborbital HASTE launches)
12 Russia

SpaceX now leads the entire world combined in successful launches in 2026, 115 to 114.

0 comments

NASA releases its space station requirements; opens bidding for the contract to build one or more

7:51 pm

The American space stations under development

NASA today released its “Request for Proposals” (RFP) for awarding construction contracts to build one or more different commercial space stations, with the deadline for submission December 8, 2026.

You can download all the documents for this RFP here. From the RFP cover letter:

This competitive acquisition will result in a Multi-Award Indefinite Delivery, Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract with the ability to issue Firm-Fixed-Priced (FFP) task orders. The contract will have an effective ordering period of 8 years from the contract effective date, and two (2) option periods to extend the ordering period as follows: a 4-year Option Period 1 and a 3-year Option Period 2 for a total potential ordering period of 15 years.

The anticipated contract award date is April 15, 2027, with an effective date occurring on the same day as the award. The contracts will primarily be performed off-site at the Contractor’s facilities; Contractors may perform some aspect of the work on-site at NASA centers as enabled by NASA Collaborations or Government Task Agreements.

The RFP’s Statement of Work (SOW) specifies three types of manned missions NASA hopes to fly to these stations:
» Read more

13 comments

Leaving Earth cover

Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.

If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.

 
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke

China launches 9 more satellites in its Guowang internet constellation

3:29 pm

China today successfully placed another nine satellites in orbit for its Guowang (Satnet) internet constellation, its Long March 12 rocket lifting off from its coastal Wenchang spaceport.

China’s state-run press has not yet confirmed the payload, but this source claims it is for the Guowang constellation, The nine satellites bring the total launched to 220, based on my count. The number could be less, around 204, based on previous reports. The full constellation will have 13,000 satellites, with the goal this year to launch 310, followed by 900 in ’27, and 3,600 each year thereafter.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

114 SpaceX
61 China
16 Rocket Lab (plus two suborbital HASTE launches)
12 Russia

SpaceX is now tied with the entire world combined, 114 to 114, in successful launches in 2026.

0 comments

October 9, 2026 Quick space links

2:48 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

17 comments

Ghana pushes legislation to create its own space agency

8:31 am

The government of Ghana this week advanced new legislation that would consolidate several already existing agencies into a single department called the Ghana Space Agency.

The government has received Cabinet approval to transform the Ghana Space Science and Technology Institute (GSSTI) into the proposed Ghana Space Agency. Environment, Science and Technology Minister Dr Zanetor Agyeman-Rawlings said work is now underway on the legislation and institutional framework required to establish the agency.

… A central agency is expected to address the fragmentation of space-related activities across government institutions. GSSTI Director Dr Joseph Bremang Tandoh said different ministries currently undertake activities requiring satellite data independently, making coordination and resource use more difficult. A national agency could coordinate the acquisition and processing of satellite imagery and make the resulting information available to government institutions.

None of this means that Ghana is about to have a real space industry. It launched its first satellite — a small student-built cubesat — in 2017, but nothing since. In 2018 there was an effort to pass its own space law, though whether that law ever passed is unclear. In 2024 it did pass a space policy that was supposed to establish this space agency, but apparently that never happened either.

Finally, in 2025 it signed a deal with Axiom in which that space station startup would help it develop its own space projects. Once again, there is no evidence that anything resulted from this deal.

It appears there is real interest in Ghana in doing something in space, but so far it has only resulted in creating government bureaucracies, and not much else.

2 comments

LeoLabs detects the break-up of a defunct Soviet-era satelite

8:08 am

The commercial satellite tracking company LeoLabs earlier this week reported that Meteor 2-7, a defunct Soviet weather satellite that ceased operations in 1982 had broken up in orbit sometime around October 5, 2026.

On 5 October, LeoLabs Delta alerted our team to multiple objects near the Soviet-era Meteor 2-7 satellite (NORAD ID 12456) following a pass over our radar site in Western Australia. Additional observations across our network confirmed that a debris-generating event occurred and resulted in an estimated tens of fragments that may pose a threat to surrounding spacecraft.

This report however is somewhat puzzling. According to other sources, Meteor 2-7 had already broken into eight pieces in March 2004 for unknown reasons. The LeoLabs report is not clear whether this incident detected a new break-up, or it was simply reporting those pieces incorrectly as a new event. Based on the evidence available, it appears there are now more separate pieces in this debris cloud, which suggests one of those pieces experienced a further break-up.

LeoLabs uses the event to tout its ground-based network for monitoring satellites and space junk. I see this event as another demonstration that there is a real need for some commercial satellite company that can remove these defunct satellites before they break-up.

2 comments

October 8, 2026 Quick space links

2:46 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay, plus the first from reader Nate P. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

11 comments

Long interview with Jeff Bezos reveals he is become a born-again capitalist

11:50 am

Jeff Bezos being interviewed by Fox News
Jeff Bezos being interviewed by Fox News

Fox News today released a long 20-minute interview by Bret Baier with Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos. I have embedded it below. In addition Bezos gave Baier a short walking tour of the New Glenn factory floor.

Bezos does not reveal much ground-shaking new information, but he does come off as an aggressive capitalist who is no longer blindly supporting leftist causes, as he has in the past. At one point in the interview, when asked about Bernie Sanders, Bezos was very careful to criticize all leftist politicians who in some twisted insane logic label “billionaires” as evil villains whose wealth somehow condemns others to poverty.

When you’re in the polling booth and your thinking about who you’re going to vote for, think about this: If there’s a politician that is picking villains and pointing fingers, that probably means they don’t have a solution. If they had a solution, instead of blaming somebody, they’d be working on that solution.

If there’s somebody at Amazon or Blue Origin or Prometheus, an executive at one of my companies, if every time they came to a meeting instead of working on a root cause and a root fix and a real solution to the problem, all they did is point finters and blame people, we would exit them quickly. Those people wouldn’t be in our company for long.

This is a refreshing change for Bezos. I suspect he is no longer sending large gobs of his spare cash to leftist NGOs, as he had in the past. It also suggests he is refocusing his efforts at Blue Origin more aggressively, and in line with good old capitalist competition. If so, hallelujah!
» Read more

15 comments

Scientists: Unique physics required to form the seasonal Martian plume flowing from giant volcano Arsia Mons

11:12 am

Mars Express image looking down at Arsia Mons
Mars Express image of the seasonal cloud, looking down at Arsia Mons. Click for original.

Using computer modeling scientists have concluded that the only way to naturally form the seasonal morning cloud that flows westward from the giant Martian volcano Arsia Mons in the spring and summer is to use unique physics that have never been seen on Earth.

On Earth and elsewhere, clouds typically form when moist air cools and water vapour condenses into liquid droplets or icy crystals. This usually happens via a process known as heterogeneous nucleation, which requires specks of other ‘stuff’ to be present in the atmosphere for vapour to cling and condense onto – salt, pollen, soot, or dust, for instance. On Mars, it’s thought to be dust.

“For the AMEC [Arsia Mons Elongated Cloud], it seems that cloud formation takes place without needing any of this ‘stuff’,” adds Jorge. “Water vapour turns directly into icy cloud particles without any middle step. It’s akin to droplets of condensation appearing in the middle of a room, rather than on a window. We call this homogeneous nucleation, and we’ve never seen it before in a planetary atmosphere. It’s wholly unexpected.”

Though their computer simulations worked best if they included this “homogeneous nucleation”, the models were still not perfect. Moreover, this conclusion says that Martian dust is irrelevant to the formation of the cloud. Yet, the cloud only forms in the spring and summer, the dusty season on Mars. Excluding that dust seems counter-intuitive.

The source of the water for this cloud also remains undetermined at this point, though it is believed to come from underground glacial ice that is thought to still exist inside caves on Arsia Mons western flanks. The volcano is in the dry tropics of Mars, where no near-surface ice presently appears to exist. Here it is believed the ice is left over from when this region was icy, trapped deeper underground inside those underground voids. Why it only sublimates away in the morning hours in the spring and summer however is also not understood.

3 comments

Musk: Starlink blocked in India by special interests

9:44 am

Starlink logo

According to a tweet by Elon Musk yesterday, the delays in getting Starlink approved in India are due to “certain oligarchs”, an accusation that Indian officials have vehemently denied.

Musk was replying to a tweet that described SpaceX’s extensive efforts to get approved in India, all to no avail. He stated:

Unfortunately, we are being blocked by certain oligarchs in order to maintain their monopolistic chokehold on the Indian people. You can guess who they are …

This is a crime against the people of India!

The second link above names billionaires Mukesh Ambani and Sunil Mittal as Musk’s likely targets, as both run their own telecommunications networks. Indian officials said all three must meet all regulatory requirements, and that the govenrment is not playing favorites.

Nonetheless, as I noted only a month ago “It seems the number of approvals required in India are endless. This process has been going on for several years, with no end in sight and no indication when Starlink will finally get an okay.”

The second link also describes another kerfuffle between Musk and India’s security forces, which claimed insurgents from Myanmur were illegally using Starlink in India. Musk denied this, saying that Starlink is turned off over India and that the the claim was “absolutely false.”

Meanwhile, in the U.S. American Airlines announced that by 2027 Starlink will be installed in all its planes. (Hat tip to reader Nate P. for this story.)

1 comment

Blue Origin confirms major expansion in Texas

9:19 am

Blue Origin logo

Blue Origin today confirmed its intention to build a major manufacturing plant in the town of Hutto, Texas, first proposed back in August.

Constellation Park will support manufacturing for TeraWave, Blue Origin’s satellite communications network delivering up to 6 terabits per second of symmetrical data anywhere on Earth – serving enterprise, data center, and government users who depend on resilient global connectivity for critical operations.

The facility will also expand production for Quartz, a global ground communications network featuring 3.7‑meter aperture antennas that enable S‑band and X‑band connectivity for low Earth orbit missions.

In addition, the campus will house manufacturing for key Blue Origin subsystems, including solar arrays, avionics, telecommunications, and other satellite hardware.

Blue Origin’s factory would cover about 1.3 million square feet, employ 2,000 people, and bring in as much as $1 billion in investment before completion. No construction schedule was provided by Blue Origin’s press release, though it said this commitment will run for the next ten years. We can hope this doesn’t mean construction will be finished ten years from now but that satellite manufacturing will occur aggressively during those ten years.

Hat tip reader Nate P.

1 comment

SpaceX’s Freedom manned capsule successfully splashes down

8:53 am

SpaceX’s Freedom manned capsule has successfully splashed down of the coast of California, and divers are in the process of securing the capsule so it can be recovered.

Live coverage is underway as NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev are almost an hour away from splashing down aboard their SpaceX Dragon spacecraft.

I have embedded the live steam below.
» Read more

0 comments
1 2 3 … 1,798